Partners
by BlackMasquerade
Summary: McGee finds a new friend in the most unexpected person. FINISHED. Sequel to follow.
1. Prologue

It's a sunny, spring afternoon in a small local park in Washington D.C. A pair of joggers were going down a path chatting as they ran; an elderly man was feeding a few pigeons from a bench.

Timothy McGee stood on a grassy spot in the center of this small park and looked around. He had to squint to see his surroundings through the reflection of the sun. The warm sun on the back of his neck felt good after a long morning of doing nothing. Naval crime had taken a day off today, but DiNozzo and his jokes hadn't. After a while McGee had simply shut his brain off and got back to playing a computer game.

It was an online RPG, he could meet and talk to people all the time. Lately he had been talking to one young woman frequently. He had been absolutely taken with her from the moment he had started talking to her. She was intelligent, funny, and aspired to be a writer. A woman after his own heart.

He turned back to walk back to his building. As he turned he nearly got run over by a teenage girl running as fast as she could. She slammed into him and he staggered, but caught her by the shoulders. She was hyperventilating.

"Woah. What's wrong?" He stammered when she looked up at him. She had a face Tony would surely have approved of. A delicately square face with huge brown eyes. Her nose was as small as a button, her lips full. Tears streamed down her face dragging her dark blue eye make-up with it.

"Body... over there... in the trees! He's dead... he's dead!" Her voice cracked and McGee steadied her with one hand while he reached for his cell phone with the other. He dialed quickly and pressed the smooth hunk of plastic to his ear.

"Gibbs."

"Hey, uh, Boss, we have a problem."


	2. Chapter 1

McGee sat poking at his plate of lasagna that evening thinking of everything that had happened that day.

A shot Lieutenant was discovered in a group of trees by a fifteen-year-old girl. He had suffered two gunshots to the chest, one to the head. The bullets were 9mm. A handgun.

He heard the girl behind him squeal and stand as her dining mate joined her.

"How are you, babe? Heard you had a rough day..."

"I'd rather not talk about it." The new voice was lovely. She sounded so mature... much like what McGee had thought blackmasque94, his gaming acquaintance would sound like.

"Well, if that suits you I suppose." The first woman said. A moment of silence.

McGee glanced at his watch. 9:00 PM. The waiter came and took his barely touched meal away. McGee asked him for the check as the women began talking again.

"So," the first woman said. "How's life with your lover?" Great she was taken.

The second woman laughed softly. It was a delicate laugh, beautiful, McGee noted.

"elflord46?"

McGee's heart stopped. That was his username.

"Yeah black..."

"Hey! No username's in public!" the second woman said.

McGee couldn't believe his luck. There, right behind him was the woman he was falling in love with online. He listened more intently now.

"He's, well I suppose..." she trailed off.

"Oh come on, you HAVE to give me more to go on than that!"

"Well, he asked me out to coffee today."

Uh-oh, McGee hadn't thought that would come up.

"Did you accept?"

She sighed. "No, I... I was stupid enough to say no."

"Oh come on? What are you afraid of? It's not like he'll turn out to be a pre-pubescent nerd or something."

"No but he could be a fifty year old pedophile."

_Ouch,_ McGee thought. That wasn't anything close to the truth. He wished he could turn around to see her.

"Or," blackmasque's friend said, "he could be completely normal."

"Maybe. But even if he is, I'm not the kind of person any normal person would want to be with in person. I'm... you know."

"You're unique, Kitty." Kitty. Beautiful.

"Unique is putting it lightly, Charlotte. I'm a bona fide freak." Both girls burst out laughing.

McGee smiled to himself. The waiter came and gave him his check. He paid while still listening to the girls.

"Excuse me for a moment." Kitty said. He heard her get up and come up to pass him. He kept his eyes glued to the table until she was several feet in front of him.

When he looked up he saw what he had always wanted to. She was maybe five foot six, with straight brown, shoulder length hair. She looked taller, due to a pair of black high-heels. She wore a sparkly gold dress cut to her knees, it had no back. She wasn't stick thin, but she looked beautiful.

She went into the bathroom, and he got up to leave. Ships passing in the night.

*******************************************************************************************

The next day McGee went into work and Gibbs was no where to be found. Granted McGee didn't look that hard. He sat at his desk as the elevator door opened. Tony DiNozzo emerged carrying a cup of coffee and a bottle of pills that looked like caffeine pills.

DiNozzo stopped at his desk and placed the coffee down carefully and opened the small bottle. He took two of the pills, which were in fact caffeine pills now that McGee could see them more clearly, and downed them with some coffee.

"Long night, Tony?" McGee asked.

"Yeah. Up all night with a couple old friends watching old Kung Fu movies." He stretched and looked at McGee. "Did we get a hold of Lieutenant Connar's family?"

"I'd ask Ziva if I were you, Gibbs told her to do that."

"Do you see Ziva around, Probie?" Tony gestured around the room.

"Yes."

"Oh very..."

"Good morning, Tony." Ziva stood inches behind DiNozzo and when she spoke he jumped a foot in the air.

He caught his breath quickly. "Good morning, Ziva. Uh, did we get a hold of the Lieutenant's family?"

"Yes, the wife was completely distraught, she has some kind of disability and can't work. She has a son and her mother lives with them..."

McGee tuned out quickly while he logged onto his game to see if Kitty was online. Sure enough she was. He didn't even need to start a conversation.

_Hey Elfy._

_Call me Tim._

_Alright Tim. Call me Kitty._

He was good with that.

_I was thinking about that coffee offer you gave me yesterday. I think I'd like to accept that._

McGee's eyes must have been the size of dinner plates. What perfect luck! He finally gets to meet her face to face. He wondered if she would be as beautiful as her voice was yesterday...

_That sounds great! What time is good for you?_

_I'm free whenever._

_Alright, I can be off work by eight tonight. There's this little café I know downtown..._

*******************************************************************************************

McGee sat in traffic at exactly 7:45 PM thinking about his day. He had accompanied Gibbs to see the family of the murdered Lieutenant.

The wife had been a wreck, her mother not much better.

The son. He had come across as completely unemotional. He sat there, gold eyes staring at the patterns on the living room rug as though they were the first time he had seen them, he sat on his hands and rocked slowly back and forth in his chair. His face was blank. Every time he blinked it was as though he had to think really hardly about the movement. All the questions they asked him were answered with a simple, empty yes or no.

"Do you have any idea who would want to do this to your father?"

"No."

"Are upset about his death?"

"Yes."

"Can you think of anything he ever said that might imply someone wanting to kill him?"

"No."

The conversation went on for a while in that same fashion. Something was wrong with that child, either a mental disability or he knew something he wasn't saying.

He pulled into a parallel space and walked into the café. A group of loud teenagers were sitting outside smoking and talking quite loudly. As he opened the door one of them made a comment about his work cloths. He wasn't paying them any attention.

He went straight to the restroom to check his hair in the mirror. He adjusted a few hairs and sighed gripping the sides of the sink. He closed his eyes tightly. _Let her like me._ He thought. He couldn't stand the thought of another girl being turned off by his nerdy qualities.

He walked out of the restroom and looked around. There was a girl sitting with her back to him. She had straight brown hair, the exact same length as Kitty had had hers yesterday.

He approached her chair quietly. She had a cell phone clutched in her hands.

He cleared his throat. "Kitty?"

The woman shifted in her chair and turned around.

McGee almost had a heart attack. She wasn't a woman at all. She was the teenager from the park who had found Lieutenant Connar.

Her eyes grew huge. "Tim?"

McGee could only nod. So much for getting his hopes up. Now he looked like a pervert.

She rose quickly and backed away. "What... you're..." she was obviously trying not to attract attention which he was happy about.

"You're... not exactly what I was expecting either." he said in a rather disappointed tone.

"I should leave." She said and walked quite quickly out of the café leaving McGee alone to feel like a failure once again.


	3. Chapter 2

Something slammed down on McGee's desk the next day pulling him out of his depressed trance. He looked up to see Tony, who was trying to look mockingly dangerous. He cocked his head to the side.

"How was your date, Probie? You look less than satisfied." He said, obviously eager to ridicule her for whatever was wrong with her. When McGee didn't answer, Tony volunteered a few options. "Was she fat? Ugly? Did she have this mole you just couldn't stop looking at 'cause it was just so obvious and disgusting..?"

McGee sighed and looked down at his hands, which were clasped on the desk before him. He spoke slowly. "No. She was..."

"Interrogation, now." Gibbs came walking swiftly past alerting the two men and Ziva, who had just exited the elevator.

Tony took one more glance at McGee, as if telling him that this wasn't over. Then he pushed himself off McGee's desk where he had been leaning and turned sharply to follow Gibbs to Interrogation.

*******************************************************************************************

Several minutes later DiNozzo and McGee stood a foot from the glass waiting for the suspect neither of them new about to enter. Ziva was standing at the back leaning against the wall reading through a folder.

"So, now that we have a moment Probie, what _was_ wrong with her?"

"Nothing was wrong with her..."

"Oh so she didn't like you? Well I don't blame her..."

"Tony. Just..."

At that moment the door inside the interrogation room opened. An officer stood blocking the view of who was coming in.

McGee turned around momentarily to alert Ziva that the suspect was here.

"Hmm. Cute kid. I remember her from the crime scene." DiNozzo said.

When McGee turned back he felt like smashing his head against the one-way glass. Of course. Kitty _would_ be in there. Tony wasn't going to let him live this one down. No way.

"Woah. McGee, man, what's wrong? You look like you just crapped your pants." He paused. "You didn't, did you?"

"You want to know what was wrong last night?" He looked at Tony angrily. He wasn't angry with DiNozzo, he was angry with himself. He wasn't supposed to screw up like this. When Tony nodded reproachfully McGee simply blurted out: "Apparently she's a murder suspect." He covered his face with his hands and sighed audibly.

He heard Tony stutter a few times. He took his hands off his face and looked at Tony's expression. The satisfied grin he had expected was not there. Instead a look of horror and disbelief.

McGee sighed. "What Tony?" He was getting irritated now.

"Tim... she... you... She's only, like, fifteen, man! That's just not right!" He exploded.

"I know."

"Then why?"

"Hey she was just as shocked as I was. We never talked about age before... We both made the mistake of assuming." McGee took a long, hard look at her through the glass. For a teenager, she was unnaturally beautiful. The way she crossed her legs, folded her hands, tucked a hair up into her loose bun, you could see she was mature beyond her years. Every movement was filled with a grace neither man had ever seen in a teenage girl before.

Tony twigged onto her eyes before McGee did.

"She's scared." He said. "You can see she doesn't know what's going on."

Ziva looked at the two men quizzically. "What's going on here?" She asked.

"She was McGee's date yesterday." Tony supplied as the door opened behind them. All three ignored the person entering.

"She's a little young for you McGee..." Ziva said.

"This was Tim's date?!" A shocked voice came from behind them. They all turned to see Abby standing there looking taken aback.

"I didn't know she was a teenager, okay?" McGee held his hands over his head so his sport coat fell off his back like a pair of wings.

Abby crossed her arms, looking hurt. "Why didn't you ask?"

McGee had no anwser for that. It was a stupid mistake, but it would have seemed weird online to just ask, _Hey, by the way how old are you?_ He put his hands down and shrugged apologetically.

Tony, sensing the growing tension, changed the subject. "Why are you here Abby? Did you find something?"

"No. Gibbs wanted me here. I don't know why, I never have to come to interrogations." She stood in between Tony and McGee to wait for Gibbs.

McGee thought he heard Abby mutter something about how pretty Kitty was but he didn't have a chance to ask. Gibbs walked into the interrogation room and sat down at the table opposite Kitty. He took a long look at her and opened a file folder in front of him. He took out a sheet of paper and showed it to the teenager across from him.

"Do you know what this is?" he asked in his usual monotone all-business voice.

Kitty nodded. McGee thought he saw a small bead of sweat form on her forehead. He couldn't believe that he had been talking to a suspect online for the last few months. He felt so stupid for not knowing.

"Miss McKinnon, we think you would be a good candidate for our new youth undercover division."

Kitty folded her hands on the table in front of her and leaned forward in her chair. "Agent Gibbs, is there more of a reason that you want me here than my IQ score?"

Gibbs sighed. "Yeah. We received the results of your latest blood test, mandatory..."

"...for people who want to donate blood. I know." She looked down at her hands and smiled softly to herself. "So you know. That there's something wrong with me."

"Nothing's wrong with you, Miss McKinnon. You are a perfectly normal teenager."

"Save the obvious, I suppose?"

"This gene is... different. It will make you a coveted resource for the government."

"Ha! Real area 51 material, eh?" She leaned back in her chair, obviously trying to look nonchalant about their conversation.

Abby, Tony and McGee were exchanging confused looks while Ziva looked perfectly calm and even bored with the interrogation.

"Yeah, area 51 might be a possibility, if you can't agree to help me."

"Why NCIS? Why am I not being contacted by the FBI, the CIA? Why NCIS?" she asked.

"Because we got to you first. We could really use someone like you. You could, honestly, revolutionize the criminal investigation business as we know it." Gibbs was sounding slightly more enthusiastic at this point in the conversation.

"I can't see people's pasts, Agent Gibbs. Or their futures. I can only tell you what's going on right at this point in time. And I don't even believe that the results of my blood tests are accurate, this could just be some blip with the machine or something..."

"Those machines are never wrong. Further more," Gibbs stood and walked around the table so he was standing next to her facing the team behind the glass, "I have an unusual number of people behind that glass. Tell me how many there are."

Kitty looked up at him as though he had lost his mind. Gibbs just looked straight ahead. Kitty licked her lips and looked at the glass. Her eyes suddenly rolled back in her head and her entire body relaxed back into the chair.

McGee started and moved closer to the glass almost running into the smooth, cold surface.

Just as suddenly as she had relaxed, her eyes rolled back into their proper position in her skull and she sat up.

"Four."

Tony spoke McGee's thoughts. "Lucky guess."

"Who's not supposed to be there?"

"One of the girls. She was thinking, about why she had to be there..."

Abby's pale skin went even paler. McGee guessed that Kitty had been right.

"She was thinking about... me. Why I'm so special, or something like that. I flew past her too quickly."

"Very good. Give me their names."

Her eyes rolled back into her head again and she relaxed. She spoke while she was under her trance now. "Anthony DiNozzo, senior field agent... Ziva David, Mossad Liaison Officer... Abby Scuito, forensic scientist... Ti-" Her suddenly snapped back to their normal position and her face turned beet red.

"Is something wrong, Miss McKinnon?"

"N-... no. Timothy McGee, probationary field agent." she said it in a dead monotone.

McGee looked at the floor and Tony looked at him. "Well, she remembers you. Let's hope she doesn't try to pin you as a pedophile, Probie." He clapped McGee on the shoulder and laughed.

"Very good. There's no doubt in my mind that your blood test wasn't wrong. You have a very special gift. Now, before you accept or decline our offer, you should know that you will be asked to spend two days being monitored in a closed off room, so we have conclusive evidence that this strand of DNA doesn't have any side effects you may not be aware of."

"Such as?"

"Violent episodes most likely to happen when you are looking into something that you may not be able to recall after the fact."

She sighed. "I suppose that is a reasonable request. I have no doubt that you will find nothing wrong with me. And at this point," she grinned, "anything to keep me out of area 51 will do."

Gibbs genuinely laughed at this. "Welcome to the team then, Agent McKinnon!" He reached down to shake her hand. He pulled her up and led her to the door. He motioned to the team to come out and meet him in the hallway.

McGee was careful to be the last one out. Tony went before him and only smiled in anticipation of what might happen next.

When they were all in the hallway, everyone was introduced. Abby was slightly more conservative in meeting Kitty face-to-face than she would have been with anyone else. Stiff, almost. DiNozzo was obviously trying to act charming, and Ziva was quite friendly, though visibly cautious.

McGee was last. He stepped forward slowly and stuck out his hand. He looked at her with a look he hoped would be apologetic. She shook his hand and gave him a small smile.

Gibbs then addressed the four team members over the age of 20. "Get back to work. One of you will always be on duty supervising Katherine. I'm putting you, McGee, on first shift. Tony, take over at 21:00."

He led Kitty away by the elbow to one of the rooms in the hallway.

*******************************************************************************************

McGee sat down at his desk and opened up the security camera feed from Kitty's room. Sure enough there she was. She stood rubbing her hands in the center of a small room. A couch stood at one wall, a TV was mounted on the opposite wall with a game system underneath. The door shared a wall with a plain oak desk. A small laptop was set up. A bed was on the fourth wall. A mini-fridge sat between the bed and the couch.

Kitty looked around a few times then settled on sitting on the couch.

"God, what have I gotten myself into?" she asked herself. She buried her head in he hands and groaned. "Well, Kitty, you got yourself into this. Nothing to do but sit around, and look normal." She started and lifted her face from her hands. "Can you hear me?" she looked at the camera.

McGee put the headset on. "Yeah."

She looked absolutely bewildered. "Should I be able to hear you?"

"Yeah. What were you expecting? The camera to nod or something?"

"Well... yes actually, I was. Or I thought I was having a moment, you know? Reading your mind or something. Hearing your thoughts..."

McGee fell silent. Finally he got up the courage to ask her something.

"Do you remember me?"

"Yep."

"Alright." he paused. "Should I apologize again? I feel like such an idiot..."

"It's my fault." she said. "I didn't even think that you could be... older than me by this much."

He decided against telling her he'd heard her talking to her friend at the restaurant.

"So, do we just sit and talk? Or do I have to do something to look normal?" she asked finally. She stood put her hands on her hips and pivoted to face the camera head-on.

"It doesn't really matter. I don't think Gibbs wants me working on the other assignment just now..."

"What assignment? I want to know what I'm going to have to help with first."

"Well," he hoped he was allowed to do this, "we have a murdered Lieutenant. Lieutenant Jim Connar..."

"Oh God, I'd forgotten that case was still open." She cut him off. "I found him remember?"

"Right. You almost knocked me over, how could I forget."

She sat on the bed and looked at the camera. "I feel terrible for Jackson. His mother can't work, he's too young to work for the both of them _and_ his grandmother." A sad look crossed her face with concern for her friend.

McGee looked at the sad girl in the locked room and felt a twinge of sadness himself. He hadn't exactly thrown himself into this case yet. He would now. For her.

He felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up to see Abby standing above him. She was looking hard at the screen with her lips pressed together in a thin line and her eyes contorted into a squint.

"I can see why you like her, Tim." Abby finally said coldly.

McGee took the headset off and looked up at her. "I didn't know she was fifteen. Alright." No reply. "Are you jealous?" he said with a small grin creeping across his face.

She pouted. Then softened her look to her cutely guilty puppy-dog face. "Just a little."

McGee laughed under his breath. Abby made an annoyed sound and turned to walk off.

McGee looked back at the screen to see Kitty walking in circles. He put his headset back on. "So. Lonely yet?"

"No. I'm fine being alone, and anyway," she looked up at the camera with a grin, "with you talking to me through a camera I feel like I'm in a sci-fi flick or something! Or I'm talking to God..."

McGee couldn't help but laugh. God, not even close to how he would describe it, but pretty good for a laugh anyway.

"So this is what it's like to be God. Or the computer from Star Trek." _Woops. Now I know why Tony calls me McGeek so much..._ McGee thought to himself.

"Ha! Yeah... think you tell me how many seconds I have left in here?" She replied.

"I could try..."

"It's okay. You should focus on finding out what happened to Jackson's dad."

McGee nodded, then realized she couldn't see him. "I guess I should. Talk to me if you need anything."

She nodded and retreated to her computer.

He looked down at the paperwork outlining some of the forensic evidence that had been found at the scene where Kitty had found the body. If he had interviewed her at the scene he would have known her name. And if he had known her name, he may have been able to put two and two together and save himself some embarrassment. But she forgave him, that was what was important.


	4. Chapter 3

McGee still sat at his table watching Kitty at 21:00. He had hardly done any work that day, even though he had promised Kitty he would. She had picked up the Wii at this point and was flicking her wrists this way and that doing various sports on the screen. She was quite good at some of these.

DiNozzo came up behind him. "Probie? You gonna go home or something?" No response. Tony sighed and sat down. "Look Probie. If you're still... thinking about last night..."

McGee looked sideways at him as though daring him to go on.

"Look Patrick Dempsey did it! Married a woman old enough to be his mother. I'm sure you two can work something out..."

"Shut up, Dinozzo." McGee said taking the headset off. "Goodnight Tony." He took one last look at the screen and left. DiNozzo put the headset on.

"Hey, kid."

"Hello, Tony."

"How's solitary confinment?"

"Better that you might expect."

"So, you and Probie know each other, eh? Pretty interesting..."

"You're just looking for dirt, so why don't you stop while you're ahead, cause you're not getting it."

"Uh..."

"Yeah. And the Patrick Dempsey thing was a nice touch, but not the kind of advice he wanted to hear."

"Oh really? And just what did he want to hear?"

"Nothing."

"Oh."

"Yeah, he's really quite embarassed. And to be honest, so am I." she flicked her wrist. Home Run.

"Can you read minds?" Tony asked the most prominent question in his mind... if she hadn't heard it yet.

"I suppose I should look at analyzing brain patterns, shouldn't I? I suppose that would fight the need for an interrogation all togther now, wouldn't it?"

"We'd catch a hell of a lot more liers, that's for sure." DiNozzo said.

"I don't know if mind reading is illegal. Do you think they've made a law on that yet?"

Tony snorted. "I doubt it, if you are the first..."

"I'm not."

"Oh?" he leaned closer to the screen.

"There are at least two more people I know who can do something. Well, one at this point."

"What happened to the other one?"

"He died of an epileptic seizure two years ago. His name was Tony."

She turned and looked at the camera. "He could move things with his mind. Which probably brought on the epilepsy in the first place." She looked back at the TV. "Whenever he took on too big of a load with his mind, he would have a seizure. One time, last year, he and his gym class when for a hike on this thin trail next to a drop off... a student fell and he tried to bring them back up. The stress of pulling them up on top of the panic he felt sent him over the edge. They saved the kid who fell, but Tony didn't make it."

"That's awful." Tony didn't know what else to say about this girl losing her friend, so he brought up the other kid. "What about the other guy?"

"I don't know. I can't figure it out, he can do something, but I don't know what." she said in a slightly exasperated tone. "He confuses me."

The conversation ended there for a while. Tony opened the folder of evidence McGee was supposed to go through and started analyzing pictures.

Ziva got up from her computer and gathered her things to go home for the night.

"Hey, Ziva? Question for you." Tony looked up at her. "Why didn't you seem at all weirded out today at the interrogation?"

"If you had read the file Gibbs had given us, you would have known what was coming up as well."

"Oh."

"Goodnight, Tony."

"'Night, Ziva."

*******************************************************************************************

The next morning McGee, Ziva and Abby came into the bullpen to find Gibbs had replaced Tony overnight on watch duty. He sat there laughing with Kitty about something. His coffee lay untouched beside him.

"Oh, wow. You remind me so much of Kelly..." Gibbs said clasping his hands behind his head.

"Who's Kelly, Boss?" McGee asked.

Gibbs started and got out of his chair. "No one important. To work, McGee, Ziva, Abbs." He sat back down and took a sip of his coffee. "Abby. Come back here."

Abby was back at the elevator already and came bounding back over. "Yes Gibbs?"

"I want you to go and take a blood sample from Kitty, compare the results to the previous ones we have from her physician. If nothing looks off, I think we can let her out early."

"Yes, sir." she ran off to go to her lab to get the materials to take Kitty's DNA.

"McGee. You're on." Gibbs stood and clapped McGee on the back when he came to take his place. "I want to talk to you later." The senior agent whispered to the junior field agent.

They made brief eye-contact and went back to work.

*******************************************************************************************

20:00 that evening everyone had gone home early save Gibbs and McGee.

McGee sat diligently at the computer screen watching Kitty typing away at her computer. She had told him she was trying to write a novel.

Gibbs came up and stood behind McGee for several minutes watching Kitty as well. The headset was sitting on the desk and the faint low-pitched beat of a song was coming through. Finally, Gibbs pulled DiNozzo's chair over to McGee's desk and sat next to him.

"DiNozzo hasn't been quiet about your previous involvment with Kitty, Tim." Gibbs said bluntly. He spoke softly though, as though being kinder about it would make it hurt less.

"No he hasn't boss." McGee agreed.

"What's your take on this, McGee?"

McGee looked into the ocean blue eyes of his boss and stuttered for a moment. "I-I don't know what you..."

"Are you going to be able to work with her or not?"

"Yes, boss."

He looked back at the screen at Kitty, thinking about how to explain how he felt. He knew that it wasn't a romantic love, for sure. But just how to explain it he didn't know...

"Ah," Gibbs smiled to himself. "I get it."

"Boss, it's not what you think..."

"Do you know what I'm thinking, McGee?" Gibbs looked at him sideways. No reply. "I understand. I feel the same way about Abbs."

McGee looked at him with a confused look on his face.

"Like..." Gibbs hesitated for a moment. "Like... a daughter."

The word sounded funny to McGee but it made sense. He looked back at the girl on the screen again, trapped in a typing fury. The longer he looked at her the more appropriate Gibbs' explanation seemed. A daughter. He couldn't stand the thought of losing her. He always wanted to see her, but he didn't feel the physical attraction that semi-defined a romantic feeling. He just nodded in response to his boss.

"Make sense, McGee?"

"Yes, boss."

"Good. See you tomorrow McGee. Ziva's coming in at 23:00 to take over." he grabbed his jacket off his desk, pushed DiNozzo's chair back towards his desk and left.

McGee looked from the closing elevator door to the screen a few times, smiled and laughed to himself happily as he sat down to watch Kitty in action.


	5. Chapter 4

"Abbs, you got her blood test back, yet?" Gibbs walked through the doorway to see Abby typing madly at her computer.

"Yeah."

"You gonna give it to me?" he spread his hands expectantly.

"Yeah." she stopped typing and pushed her wheeled chair to the table for evidence behind her and picked up a sheet of paper and handed it to him. "Normal. Well, as normal as it gets for someone who's practically clairvoyant..."

"Thanks, Abbs." A quick kiss on the cheek and he ran off out the door again.

Abby turned back to her computer. Gibbs came back.

"What else do you have for me?"

"I thought you'd never ask!" She stood and swiveled around to face him at lightening speed. "The gun that Lieutenant Connar was shot with was his own gun, standard military issue handgun. The striations were a match to a case several years ago when he shot a suspect terrorist who was pointing a gun at the late Lieutenant, even though he had a bomb strapped to his chest. Wierd eh? Why not just detonate the bomb?"

"The gun, Abbs?"

"Now, he couldn't have shot himself because, well, there was no gun found at the scene. So someone with access to his personal effects would have been able to get their hands on it. The Connar house has not been broken into ever so that would imply..."

"One of the family members."

"Yes! Or, you know, a family friend who just likes poking through peoples stuff."

"Thanks Abbs!" Gibbs ran off again.

******************************************************************************************

Several doors down, Leroy Jethro Gibbs opened the door to the holding room where Kitty was being surveilled.

She sat on the couch, laptop in tow, laughing with her head tilted back.

"Oh dear, you're not serious?" She looked at the screen then glanced sideways quickly.

"Never mind, I'll talk to you later." She closed the laptop and stood, brushing off her jeans. "Yes, boss?"

Gibbs stepped forward and looked down at her. "Welcome to the team, Agent McKinnon." He handed her a badge and shook her hand.

"No gun?"

"We have to train you for that."

"Gotcha."

Gibbs exited the room and Kitty followed closely. They rounded the corner to meet the team huddled around McGee's computer screen where Kitty had been moments before. They looked up. Tony grinned ear to ear. He pushed himself off from leaning on the table and came over to shake Kitty's hand.

"Welcome to the team, officially this time!" He said.

"Thanks, Tony." Kitty smiled back.

Ziva walked smoothly from McGee's desk back to her own and McGee stood up, smiling at Kitty.

"The case, people? What have we got?"

"Possible motive, boss." Tony stood up and manouvered around his desk while opening a file. "Turns out, the Connar's were looking at filing for bankruptcy within the month. The Lieutenant had a half-million dollar life insurance policy on him. The wife may have thought it a good idea to kill him for the money..."

"Good idea but no dice, Tony." Kitty stepped forward so she was facing him and Gibbs at once. "I've met her a few times..."

"What?" Tony looked dumbfounded.

"Oh sorry, I thought McGee would have told you I told him that. Anyway," she shook her head and got back on track, "I've met her a few times when I went to hang out with Jackson, she could barely climb the stairs. She had a mild form of muscular dystrophy AND arthritis. There's no way she could have fired a gun without hurting herself. Plus," she continued looking back and forth from DiNozzo to Gibbs. "There is no way she hauled the body from wherever she shot him to that park."

"Good, McKinnon, proving your worth already." Gibbs looked down at her approvingly then to Tony for a smack upside the head. "I want to talk to that son of hers."

"He's out of town, Gibbs. He left yesterday for a comic convention in Norfolk with Kevin Carlisle."

"You're kidding me." Gibbs leaned down onto his desk. "Find him!" He hollered at Tony.

"On it boss!"

"No need, I can have him in an hour." Gibbs looked at Kitty with a questioning look on his face. "I have Kevin Carlisle's number. He's my ex-."

"Who keeps their ex-'s number?" Tony asked in a hushed voice to McGee.

"I do. He happens to still be one of my best friends." she pulled a sleek black LG from her pocket and pressed the 4 button.

"4 on speed-dial... ten bucks says they're not really exes..." Tony said skeptically being ended with a smack from Kitty.

"Kev? Hey! Is Jackson there? What? Oh, dear. Alright. Can I have his number?" She grabbed a sticky pad and a pen from Ziva's desk and scribbled down a set of digits. "Thanks, Kev, I owe you. Yep. Bye." She snapped the phone shut and re-opened it.

"He told Kev he couldn't make it. Said he had homework. That's bull if I ever heard it, the kid' s a genius he never has homework." She dialed the phone and put it up to her ear.

She quickly snapped it shut. "No answer."

She ran back to the room where she had been watched for the last day and came back with the laptop she had been using. "I CAN however..." she took the battery cover off the phone and popped the battery out. She pulled a small microchip out and put it in a slot on the laptop, "...tell you where the cell phone is. He has it on him all the time. Where that phone is, he is."

"Good, you have 54 minutes left." He looked at the rest of the team. "Go do something useful!" he shouted when no response came.

"Yup." Tony said, going around the corner to talk to Ducky.

"Can do, Boss." McGee said sitting down and typing madly.

"Yes, sir." Ziva said going to the lab to talk to Abby.

******************************************************************************************

"Ducky?" Tony called as the door slid open to reveal the white autopsy room.

"Dr Mallard will be back in a moment, Tony, can I help you at all?" Jimmy stood from the desk to meet him.

"I need to know if you found anything with our Lieutenant."

"Besides the fact that he died from a 9mm shot to the chest? Not really." he said apologetically. "Tox-screen came back clean, and everything else looked normal too, sorry, Tony."

"We really don't have much to go on, here, Palmer!"

"I know, I'm sorry, you should check with Abby..."

"No need, Mr Palmer..." Ducky walked in briskly, patting Tony's shoulder as he passed. "We did find something that may help you, Anthony." He opened the cooler and pulled the drawer out to reveal the dead face and torso of Lieutenant Connar. "The entry wound showed us that the shot was fired head on straight into his chest, through his heart which killed the poor man. There was a laceration on his left hand which had trace amounts of gunshot residue embedded in the wound which would lead us to believe that he was close to his attacker AND he saw it coming with so little time to spare that all he could do was raise a hand in defense."

"Thanks, Duck." Tony looked up at Palmer with a smug look on his face and left.

******************************************************************************************

"Abby, do you have anything else we can use?" Ziva asked when she entered the music filled lab.

The black-clad scientist turned to face her with an excited look on her face. "Yes, I do!"

She led the Mossad officer to the evidence table. She held up a bag containing a pink flower petal. "This petal came from a Phalaenopsis Orchid which definatly doesn't grow outside. This was collected from the collar of the Lieutenant, which was probably picked up when he fell from the shot. The dirt from the park would have masked the dirt from the pot where this orchid was growing IF the dirt at the park didn't have the same chemical make up as the orchid dirt."

She turned swiftly and walked over to her computer pressing several keyboard buttons which brought two chemical composition charts up onto the screen.

"The one on the left has a high amount of nitrogen, phospherus and potassium compared to the one on the right because the one on the left housed this orchid. Nitrogen, phospherus and potassium are three components in..."

"Fertilizer." Ziva finished. "So he was murdered indoors. Any idea which indoors he was killed in?"

"No, but I CAN tell you that he died in a carpeted room. Those white fibres you took out of the sole of his shoe and from his fingernails where a match to each other and they contained 75% cotton and 25% nylon fibres."

"The Connar's living room had a white carpet."

"Then I'd bet he was killed there."

"There was no blood there when we went to talk to them the other day. Perhaps they cleaned."

"Then the chances of you finding blood are slim to none, if they did a good job."

"They did."

******************************************************************************************

Tim listened uselessly and Gibbs watched as Kitty sat at Ziva's desk typing madly at her laptop.

"Eureka!" she finally exclaimed. "He's in a house I don't recognize... it's in a VERY suburban neighbourhood..."

"Let's go!" Gibbs picked up his keys and led the two to the elevator.

"Boss!" Tony called to them as the doors began to close. Ziva's hand appeared in the door and the two stepped in.

"What have you got for me?"

"Ducky told me he was shot head on, straight into his heart. Lieutenant Connar's about 6'1", which would have made his attacker about 5'8". The son fits the height description."

"Abby found orchids, dirt with fertilizer and carpet fibres which all suggest he was killed indoors. The carpet fibres could be a match to the living room fibres. There were also other orchids around their home, he probably crashed into a pot on the way down."

"Good. Kitty you still got a fix?" Gibbs asked as they exited the elevator in the parkade.

"Yes, he's staying put, for now."


	6. Chapter 5

Ziva, Tony and Gibbs had all taken Gibbs' car following McGee in his Porsche with Kitty. They were now driving to the house where Kitty had found Jackson.

"Kitty can I ask you something?"

"Sure, what's up?"

"Why didn't you just find him with your head. Or, you know, whatever it is you do."

Kitty fell silent next to him for a moment. "Um, I don't know. I guess I wanted to prove that I could do something besides what I do so often. I really don't know, that seems quite stupid of me now that you mention it."

"Hm."

"He's moving." Kitty said. She decided to close her laptop and do this manually, now that McGee had pointed out what she'd done.

She had been practicing in her room over the last day, looking at things happening, so now she could see things without having her eyes roll back into her head. She could look perfectly normal when she was doing something so abnormal. She dialed her phone and ran a hand through her hair.

"Hey, Boss, it's Kitty. Yeah. He's moving. Yeah. Just follow McGee I'll direct him, okay? Okay. Bye." She hung up.

She rested her head on the back of the seat. "Left here, we might be able to catch him. He's in a car. He's not driving, he's in the passenger seat next to someone. If he turns I can see who it is."

"I thought you could see what was going on…"

"I can see what's happening to people when I know who I'm looking for. I don't know who's in the driver's seat, because I don't know who I'm looking for in that seat. If that makes sense." She paused. "They're going downtown."

McGee turned and headed in the same direction.

******************************************************************************************

After several hours of driving Kitty finally sat up. "They're not stopping tonight."

She opened her phone. "Gibbs, he's not stopping tonight. Yeah, he knows. He probably knows I'm trying to find him. Well, do you blame him? I've been gone from school for two days, I never miss school, if he did this he could have put two and two together… alright. Yeah, I'll tell him. Meet you there. We'll get him tomorrow; he'll be at the high school. Bye." She hung up. "Go back to the office; we're closing down for tonight. We're getting him at the school tomorrow."

"How do you know he'll be there?"

"He never misses school."

******************************************************************************************

Gibbs, Ziva and Tony walked into the office from the elevator where McGee and Kitty were waiting.

"Boss." The two greeted him.

"McKinnon, you're staying at McGee's apartment tonight." Gibbs said rounding the corner to his desk.

"Uh, yes boss."

"We get him tomorrow from the school. We meet out front there at 10:00 hours."

******************************************************************************************

"Here we are, it's not much, but it's home." McGee ushered Kitty in to his apartment. She looked around and immediately gravitated to the type-writer.

"Is this where the magic happens?" she said laying a gentle hand on the keys, sure not to push any.

"Yep. It's a little old-fashioned for you I suppose…"

"Not at all. Too new-fashioned if anything." McGee looked at her with a confused look.

"I do my best work with a quill and ink. It sets a…"

"Mood." He finished.

"Exactly. Although I must admit, I can't use a quill and ink without getting the ink everywhere. I'm cursed, I swear!" She laughed and laid her backpack on the couch.

"I'll go get you a sleeping bag." McGee said excusing himself.

Kitty looked around the living room as he left. He went and dug through the top of his closet. A sudden hushed sound of a trumpet peaked his interest as he walked back out with the sleeping bag he had pulled from.

Kitty had slipped a Phil Harris record into the record player.

"_Well I'm a fella with a heart o' gold, n' the ways of a gentleman I've been told…"_

McGee couldn't help but smile. He had managed to find the one person in the world who was an exact replica of himself. A jazz-loving writer who just happened to have an interest in forensics.

Kitty turned from the player and smiled back at him. She glanced at his bookshelf and gasped. She walked over to it briskly and picked up a book. "You have Deep Six!"

_Uh-oh._ McGee thought quickly.

"I love this book! The story was so realistic, the characters were believable, like _really_ believable! He writes beautifully."

_Well, everyone else knows._ "Thanks."

"Huh?" she looked up at him from the book. She looked back at the authors name for a moment. Her eyes moved back and forth like she was re-lettering the name. "Oh! 'Thom E Gemcity' is 'Timothy McGee' mixed up. Wow, you wrote this?"

"Every word."

Kitty gaped speechlessly. "Wow." She finally came up with, putting the book back. McGee handed her the sleeping bag. "Thanks." She said.

"You want some coffee or something?"

"Coffee would be nice, please."

He walked into his kitchen. He opened the canister of coffee grounds when he heard Kitty walk in behind him.

"Will I get to go back home?" she asked quietly.

"I'm sure you will, why do you ask?" he asked hesitantly.

"Because, Gibbs wanted me here tonight. Why wouldn't he let me go to my place?"

"I don't know. Maybe he thinks it isn't safe for you to be alone."

"Well then my parents are in danger too!"

"No! No! I mean, Gibbs knows what he's doing, and I'm sure he has a good reason for it. If he thinks your family's in trouble he'll have them taken care of." McGee turned around to see her terrified expression for a split second before she replaced it with a look of reassurance.

"If you say so, McGee." She sat up on his counter and looked at the floor.

******************************************************************************************

The next morning Ziva and Tony were standing by the hood of DiNozzo's car arguing about something when McGee and Kitty pulled up in the Boxter.

The front of the school was brick with full-length windows which showed the vice-principal offices within the seven year old building. To the right of the front automatic doors was another full-length window exposing the foods kitchen and the sewing room.

Kitty stepped out of the car and looked at McGee over the roof.

"Do you think I'll get to come back here, McGee?" she asked in a melancholy tone twinged with a nostalgic longing to be part of one of life's best (and worst) experiences of high school.

"I really don't know." He replied locking the car and walking briskly over to Ziva and Tony whose argument was finished and punctuated by a deathly glare from Ziva to the side of Tony's head. Tony was already smiling to Kitty.

"Tell me, Tony," Kitty said, "Why are you always so happy to see me?"

"Well, you know, you're the new _Probie_ if I understand correctly, Kitty." He leaned sideways on the hood of his car, crossed his arms over his chest and smirked wickedly.

"She's already a full-fledged agent in her category, DiNozzo." Gibbs' voice came from behind the smirking agent who, out of habit, cringed, expecting a smack upside the head. It came the moment he felt secure.

"Thanks, boss."

"No problem. Let's get this kid." Gibbs tossed a black object to Kitty. She caught it and looked down to see what it was. It was a Glock 9mm handgun.

"Boss…" she said gaping up at her supervisor.

"Yeah?" he asked in his 'duh' tone.

Kitty smiled hugely and attached the holstered weapon to her belt.

They walked in the front door of the building and into the front office. The secretary looked up. She was a woman of about forty with straight shoulder length deep red hair, dark green eyes and thick, chic black rimmed glasses.

"Kitty! Welcome back, I've been seeing you on the absent list for over two days now…" as her eyes settled on the weapon on the teens belt her voice faded quickly.

Gibbs stepped in. "NCIS, we're here to take a student into custody."

The secretary looked into Kitty's eyes. "Kitty… what have you…"

"Not. Her." Gibbs said each word like an individual sentence. "Jackson Connar. Can you tell us where he is?"

At that moment a Gibbs look-alike burst through the double doors into the main office hauling a gangly sixteen-year-old in by the elbow. He had a blue print crunched in his left fist. He looked at Gibbs as he walked in.

"Who are you?" he asked brusquely.

"NCIS." Gibbs replied looking into the man's face and crossing his arms over his chest.

"NCIS huh? Well then you should be looking at _this_." He shoved the paper into Gibbs' face. Gibbs didn't flinch and Tony took the paper before his boss lost it. He opened the folded blue sheet and looked it over.

"Boss…"

"What, DiNozzo?" Gibbs said calmly.

"Boss, this is a layout of the school. This kid's planning a shooting."


	7. Chapter 6

Gibbs grabbed the kid's shoulder and pushed him into a chair. "Who's helping you?"

"No one." The kid answered.

"Boss he's lying there are names on this sheet, Spencer Winer, Brendon Lyce, Ja…" he paused and his eyes grew to the size of dinner plates. "Jackson Connar."

"Who. Else." If looks could kill, Gibbs would have murdered the shrinking teenager before him in the first degree.

"Liam Clive, Sam Umar, and Neil Cross." The kid said.

"I want all these kids in custody, _now_, DiNozzo!" Gibbs shouted as he drew his gun and half ran out of the office.

Ziva, Tony and McGee all pulled out their guns and Kitty followed suit quickly.

They all started towards the hallway. A large flight of stairs led to the top floor. Gibbs stopped, pivoted and faced Kitty head on.

"Want to prove yourself to this team? Find those kids."

Kitty stared into Gibbs' suddenly icy blue eyes and McGee could see her eyes fly off to find the kids.

"Jackson is waiting at a table in the lower east hallway. Spencer is in the upper west bathrooms. Brandon is on the football field smoking a cigarette. Spencer is checking his cell phone for the time. _'It's now or never.'_ He's saying. He's getting up. Ah!" she exclaimed coming out of her place far away. "He just pulled a rifle out from under his hoodie. He's calling Jackson and Brent. He said _'It's time.'_"

"Tell us where to go." Gibbs said.

Kitty thought quickly. "Boss, you and, uh, Ziva take the upper-west hallway that's where Spencer will be. Tony you and McGee go for the back door over there at the back of the caf. I'm taking Jackson."

"Not alone."

"I can handle him, boss! Please," she looked at him seriously. "I can handle him."

Gibbs sighed irritatedly. "You heard the girl, move!"

He and Ziva bolted up the stairs. Tony started for the back door and McGee and Kitty made eye contact one last time, as though wishing they didn't have to break up, and moved out.

******************************************************************************************

Kitty walked calmly straight ahead halfway down the hallway. There was Jackson. Sitting straight up in his chair his hands clasped before him, staring straight ahead.

"Hey," Kitty said nonchalantly.

"Hey." He nodded in response.

"What are you doing here, Jackson? Shouldn't you be doing homework in the library or something?"

"You know I never do."

"But why don't you go and do something. With your life Jackson, you're fifteen and you show no signs of ambition, of wanting more than you have, of wanting to be more."

"You know why I'm here, Kitty, stop trying to be Kevin."

"Jackson," she looked into the classroom he was sitting next to. Alix Boyd looked back at her. She could feel the effects of his genes radiating in her brain, a feeling she couldn't ignore. Without her expecting it, his voice rang out in her mind. _'You want to know what I do?'_ she nodded. As she watched his books levitated off the floor and sat up on his desk without any help from his body.

"What, Kitty?" a flash in front of her directed her attention back to Jackson sitting before her. A great black mass hit her over the head and the world went black.

******************************************************************************************

Kitty McKinnon woke sitting tied with a skipping rope to a railing in one of the teacher's lounges. She shifted her weight and groaned. Her head was throbbing.

A pair of blue eyes was looking into hers.

"Gibbs?" she croaked.

"Don't remember me, Kitty?" a girlish voice came from the eyes before her.

"Spencer. What...?"

"Your boss and _Mossad_ officer are here, as well as your cop and geek friends, too." He gestured with his eyes.

Kitty looked sideways to see her friends sitting, handcuffed to the railing next to her. Tony sat next to her looking at Spencer like a starving man looked at a live cow; possible meal. Gibbs sat beside him with Ziva on his other side and McGee on the end. McGee's eyes were closed and his lip bled.

"What did you do to him?" she asked with a growl.

"Ha! I didn't do anything, Kitty-kins. You can thank Brendon for his face upgrade." He gestured behind him to a beautiful model-like boy half-sitting on a desk behind him. Brendon saluted her sarcastically.

Spencer stood.

"I'll leave you in Brendon's able hands for now." He turned to whisper something to Brendon. Spencer's dreads were the same colour as Brendon's ball cap.

Spencer turned back to Kitty. Addressing Brendon he said, "She's all yours." Brendon's face lit up.

Kitty knew from previous English classes spent with Brendon that any opportunity for a little fun would be taken, and abused.

Kitty's whole body started to convulse and thrash. She tried to get loose as Brendon crouched a few feet from her. Finally in her frustration she screeched the most high-pitched screech any of the team had heard and spat in Brendon's face. He laughed and wiped it off, slapping her.

Spencer laughed and left.


	8. Chapter 7

The five agents sat on the floor against the wall in the small staff room, handcuffed to a railing on the wall. There weren't enough handcuffs, because Kitty hadn't been outfitted with a pair, so a skipping rope from the school gym was used to restrain her thrashing body. Brendon was staring down at Kitty with a suggestive look on his beautiful face. His semi-automatic .22 calibre rifle was clutched in one hand.

The door opened and Spencer walked into the room. His loose fitting hoodie hung off his frail body and he smiled down at them cutely, in the most diminutive way possible.

"So! How are we doing now, huh?" he crouched and looked into Gibbs' eyes. Gibbs stared right back, emotionless.

Ziva sat to Gibbs' left and everyone heard her handcuffs clank together as she fought to get free to strangle the young boy.

Spencer laughed, clapped Gibbs on the shoulder and stood. He looked at Brendon. "We'll be ready in about fifteen minutes, we're just getting the last of the school into the gym."He left and closed the door.

Brendon looked down at Kitty and crouched before her. He out the butt of his gun on the floor to steady himself and he looked into her eyes. McGee could tell by the look in her eyes she wanted to kill him.

"So, Kitty," Brendon said leaning in closer, "you know what I can do in fifteen minutes?"

Her eyes reached the size of dinner plates and her whole body convulsed as he leaned in even further. She was sitting on the extreme right end of the line of agents so every could see him lean over her right cheek and start sucking on her neck.

McGee felt a rage rush through him, an unquenchable fiery rage that quickly took over him. "HEY! GET OFF HER!" He yelled tugging at the handcuffs that bound him to the railing, as though he could reach across the three people between them and help her.

Brendon looked over at him and gave him an evil smirk and went back to his work. When he reached her shoulder, Kitty's whole body was shaking.

Then, a single, blurred movement Kitty's head had flung forward, her head turned and she sank her teeth into Brendon's neck. He screamed and punched her in the gut to get her to let go. She obliged and his body flew back and hit the opposite wall.

An audible gasp came from everyone but Gibbs while the blood spurted unceasingly from his jugular vein, which Kitty had pierced. His body convulsed and he clutched at his neck to try and stop the blood flow. Finally he sank to the floor and stopped shaking.

McGee looked at Kitty. Blood dripped down her chin onto her shirt and her face was smeared with the glossy burgundy. She was breathing heavily, as though she had just ran a marathon. Her eyes blazed with the same furry McGee had felt only moments earlier. After a few seconds her expression softened and she leaned her chin on her chest. She was still shaking. The edges of her eyes were wet in seconds.

Tony, who was next to her, slid down the railing to offer his shoulder to her as a alternative to a hug. She looked up at him thankfully and shook the tears from her eyes.

"What do we do boss?" she asked. A tone of hopelessness tugged lightly at her voice.

Gibbs only looked down and sighed. "I really don't know."

Kitty leaned her head on the wall behind her, a dead look emanating from her eyes. The airy, hollow, jagged sigh that escaped her lips reflected the emotions of the whole group.

"Good work with that Brandon kid, Kitty. That took guts." Gibbs said, breaking the silence that had ensued.

Kitty smiled. The door opened.

Spencer walked in and look at Brandon in horror. He turned to McGee, the Ziva, and in turn Gibbs and Tony. Finally he looked at Kitty.

"Bitch! What the fuck... you know you'll die for this, right?"

"I don't care, Spencer."

Everyone looked at her in shock. Kitty hadn't been the kind who ever talked back. None of them had expected that she would talk back to someone who had the power to kill her.

"Well, you'll be happy to know that I will. In front of the whole school. You'll be first. Jackson!" He called out into the hallway. Jackson came in the door and didn't even flinch at the sight of Brandon on the floor and the blood on Kitty's chin. Spencer tossed him his hoodie, which he took off to reveal his shirt. The sleeves had been torn off and the remaining holes torn down the naval area.

"Clean her up and bring them all out. I'll send Carver and Parker in to help you." he strode out.

Jackson crouched and began to wipe Kitty's face off with the hoodie.

"Jackson," Kitty said softly, "you don't have to do this. You can stop him. This doesn't have to happen."

"Yes, it does." his voice was dead.

"Why?"

"Because we killed my dad Kitty! My mom and grandmother are going into fricken care facilities and I'm being put in foster care. Foster care! I'm not going through that. I'd sooner go to jail."

"You will at this point Jackson, please, don't do this!" Kitty begged, tugging forward to follow him as he stood, she barely made it off the floor. "Jackson, please!"

"Sit down." he pointed a 9mm pistol at her.

She sat. "That's what you..."

"Killed him with? Spencer killed him, Kitty."

"Why?"

"Why are you so nosey?"

"We're going to die. Give us some closure." She said flatly.

"I was supplying Spencer with his weed. My dad caught me, said he was going to send me to military school. Spencer decided he didn't like that idea very much. He took my dad's pistol from the mantle and shot him. Okay?"

Kitty looked at him for a long time. "Jackson, please. You haven't done anything yet! We can probably cut you a deal or something... you can stop this!"

"I don't want to stop this. You of all people can understand..."

"Why you want to feel strong? Jackson..." she whispered his name. McGee could the see tears coming up at the edges of her delicate eyes. "I was always on your side."

"It doesn't matter now."

Two skinny boys came in carrying guns, one a sawed-off shotgun, the other a professionally silenced handgun.

They pointed their guns at Kitty while Jackson untied her, then retied her after she was standing and off the rail.

The boy with the handgun took Kitty's elbow and pointed the gun at her temple. "Try anything, and she's dead."

The others were all un-cuffed and re-cuffed and the second boy stood behind them with Jackson as the first boy led the group to the gym with Kitty still in his grasp.

He opened the door and ushered the agents into the hands of one more guy with a machine gun who led them into the gym. The bleachers were full of students and teachers all gasping and crying when they saw the five agents be led into the gym and sat down on chairs.

Spencer paced back and forth for a few minutes staring each of the agents down, his rifle in hand, his pupils huge.

He stopped in front of Gibbs. "So, _Special Agent_ Gibbs..." he spoke in a diminutive fashion to possibly the only man in the room with his head screwed on straight. Spencer pulled out Gibbs' badge, which had been confiscated along with their weapons. "_Ex-_Marine, Special Agent... Do you see your team sitting here about to die? Hm? How does that make you feel? I said," he hit Gibbs across the face with the butt of his rifle, "_how does that make you feel?_ Agent Gibbs."

Jethro looked up at Spencer like he was going to rip his esophagus out. "It's gonna be sweet watching you die."

"Ha! Such confident words..."

Kitty zoned out searching the room for Alix. He could help them, he had telekinesis, he could get them their weapons and un-cuff them. He could save this school.

She found him sitting with the rest of their English class. She tried to tap into his brain.

_'Alix? For God's sake you had better hear me...'_

_'I hear you, Kit.'_

_'I need you to help us. Get us our guns, un-cuff us, we can take care of Spencer...'_

_'Kit, I can't.'_

_'Why not, Alix?'_

_'Because, if I let people know about what I can do... I won't have a home anymore. My parents will disown me. I can't go through that, Kit. I'm sorry.'_

_'Alix, I can personally guarantee that you will be safe if you do this. If your parents disown you, you'll be taken in by the agency. You'll be fine.'_

_'I don't think, I can...'_

_'I _know_ you can.'_

He looked into her eyes skeptically for a few moments then looked over to the box on which the guns sat. Kitty watched the box intently. One of the guns twitched. The guns slowly filed off the box and went to hover, concealed under the agents chairs.

_'Don't move, no matter what.'_ Alix pleaded into the minds of Kitty and her colleagues.

The cuffs fell into mid-air behind the agents and the guns slid into their hands.

_'On my mark.'_

"Who did I say would die first? Oh yes! Ms Kitty McKinnon..." Spencer aimed his rifle at Kitty's skull.

_'Now.'_

All the agents stood with their guns ready in a split second. Spencer looked at them all wildly. The two boys who had accompanied the team in, as well as the usher with the machine gun recognized defeat and put their guns down and backed away.

_Teenagers are so easy._ Kitty thought.

Jackson, after a moment, decided to follow suit. Only Spencer remained with his gun trained on Kitty. Five handguns were loaded and aimed at him.

"You can't win, Spencer. It's time to stop this." McGee said taking one step forward putting him right next to Kitty.

"Oh really?" Spencer turned the gun and shot McGee in the chest.

"NO!" Kitty shrieked and two guns discharged in that second. Two bodies fell to the ground. A punk, who's forehead now contained a perfectly round hole. And a young woman, who's neck was bleeding profusely. He had fallen a deranged drug addict. She had fallen a young peace-seeker.

Gibbs ordered Tony and Ziva to cuff the four other boys while he crouched to check the life-signs of his two agents. He looked on to the closed-eyed faces of his Probie, Timothy McGee, and his Youth Agent, Kitty McKinnon who was slumped over McGee's chest. Their blood pooled together on the floor at Gibbs's feet and he raised two fingers to their throats to find a pulse.


	9. Epilogue

She opened her eyes only to see a blinding light. No tunnel. Just a light. _Must have made it through the tunnel already._ She thought. She stared at the light for a few moments and a shape formed itself around the edges. A rectangle of white metal. A pattern of tiles surrounded that an before long an entire ceiling formed itself before her.

She looked down at her feet and read the backwards sign on the glass door, 'Recovery'.

She listened to the moans and groans of twenty or so patients around her, all laying in a fragile state, coming back to reality in the Bethesda Recovery Ward.

She looked to her right to see an elderly man still in his coma-like state. She turned to her left to meet a pair of brilliant green eyes gazing back at her.

"Hey," she whispered in more of a croak. She cleared her throat.

"Hey." He replied. His voice sounded smooth as butter, and his eyes seemed to stand out from the rest of his smooth face. Kitty was sure this was the result of the anesthetic still needing to wear off. "Tell me something."

"Anything."

"Tell me your okay." Kitty could see tears beginning to form in his eyes.

"I'm okay."

"You were shot in the neck."

"How do you know? He shot you first."

"Nurse told me." A tear slipped out from the corner of his eye, and he just let it fall. Soon a second came out of his other eye, crossed over the bridge of his nose and slid into the crease under his right eye.

Kitty tried to move her legs. They wouldn't move though she could feel each muscle tense as she tried to move them. She had had experience in the recovery room before and knew that this was normal. McGee didn't. He cursed under his breath and his voice caught. Several more tears followed the first two.

"Hey, hey," Kitty looked at him. He looked at the ceiling quickly to try and keep himself in check. He looked back at her. "I'm fine. They work. I promise."

He let out a small 'ha' and said: "I guess you'd know for sure."

She nodded shortly. "Are you okay?"

"Been better."

She did a quick mental exam to double check. Everything was fine. She let out a sigh of relief.

"I thought he killed you."

"I know." He replied. "I thought you wouldn't make it, either." He confided.

"I know."

They exchanged smiles and a nurse came to each bed to wheel them off to their respective rooms.


End file.
